Nine Inch Nails offers freebie of new album

By Susan Visakowitz

NEW YORK - In a surprise move, Nine Inch Nails posted access to a free download of its new album, "The Slip," on its Web site on Monday morning (May 5).

The 10-track album is available in its entirety in several formats -- including MP3 and high-quality, "lossless" audio compression options like FLAC -- via a link on NIN.com. All of the formats come free of digital rights management.

A statement on the site from frontman Trent Reznor says simply, "Thank you for your continued and loyal support over the years -- this one's on me."

Nine Inch Nails plans to release "The Slip" on CD and vinyl in July and will use traditional brick-and-mortar distribution. Further details about the physical product have yet to be announced.

The band's manager, Jim Guerinot, told Billboard.com that the timing for the free digital download felt right because "we just put a record out (and) we're going on-sale with tickets."

He added that Reznor's "been in a prolific phase and we didn't want 'business' to get in the way of getting the art in the hands of the fans. We've looked at the climate and the many advantages of being able to do whatever we want without bureaucracy."

"The Slip" features Reznor on vocals and various instruments, as well as Josh Freese, Robin Finck and Alessandro Cortini. Guerinot also told Billboard.com that Reznor "worked again with his team of Alan Moulder and Atticus Ross out of his garage" on the recording and said that word of the album arrived late.

"(Trent) let me know there was some new music coming, and the next thing I knew there was a full-length record done," Guerinot said. "It's very exciting to be finishing mixing on Thursday, mastering Friday, finishing artwork on Saturday and having the world hear it (Monday morning)!"

To get the download of "The Slip," site users need to provide an email address, to which a link is sent that includes access to all format options. All downloads also include a PDF with lyrics and artwork.

This is the first time Nine Inch Nails has made a new album available completely and exclusively for free as a digital download.

Demand for the new music appeared to be immediate and heavy. Just after 2:30 p.m. British time, the site was slowed to a crawl because of traffic.

Like the band's previous album, "Ghosts I-IV," "The Slip" is being released under a Creative Common license, so it can be redistributed freely. Reuters/Billboard